A sudden squall in Hyde Park, Thomas Rowlandson

The fashionable throngs which Rowlandson, with his marvellously faithful pencil, has so often drawn, disporting themselves in the paths of frivolity amidst the haunts of the ton, are viewed by him under a more excited aspect. The promenaders, in a state of sauve qui pent, are rushing off pell-mell in an attempt to preserve their dripping finery from the effects of a sudden thunderstorm. The Prince of Wales, in ''blue and buff' on horseback, followed by his groom, is pushing forward for Carlton House ; Lord Barrymore, in his lofty phaeton, has to exert all his charioteering skill to restrain his terrified and plunging high-mettled steeds ; while the fair companion perched by his side, high over the heads of the humbler stream of struggling humanity, is complacently enjoying the spectacle of the dilemmas around her. A sturdy old admiral, in an advanced stage of corpulence, is rather enjoying the opportunity, to which the ruffling winds are contributing, of viewing the points of the dishevelled fair, with spyglass in hand.
Courtesy of Boston Public Library

Thomas Rowlandson - English caricaturist of the 18th and early 19th centuries Britain, known for his humor, caricatures, satirical drawings, and watercolors, a popular artist in the Regency period in England.